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CP Joshi’s Congress Employment Guarantee Council

Close on the heels of Congress president Sonia Gandhi exhorting party members to act as “guardians of NREGA” in the August edition of party mouthpiece Congress Sandesh, Rural Development Minister C P Joshi has packed the apex body monitoring the implementation of UPA government’s flagship National Rural Job Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) with his partymen, edging out the original architects of the scheme.

The Central Employment Guarantee Council (CEGC), the apex body under the NREG Act to monitor the implementation of the scheme, has six sitting Congress MPs, one ex-MP of the party and another Congress functionary from UP who heads the party’s NREGA cell in UP.

“There have been some complaints about the implementation of NREGA. I call on you all to be the ‘guardians of NREGA’, ensuring that people get due access to employment through NREGA, as well the fair wage that they are entitled to. We must ensure that this scheme does not fall victim to corrupt and inflexible bureaucratic practices,” Sonia wrote in her letter to party workers in the August edition of Congress Sandesh.

Eight of the 14 Congress-affliated non-official members of the CEGC nominated by Joshi, who will officially act as ‘guardians’ of the scheme as members of CEGC, are:

• Sandeep Dikshit, MP from Delhi

• Narayan Singh Amlabe, MP from Madhya Pradesh

• Bhakta Charan Das, MP from Orissa

• M I Shanavas, MP from Kerala

• Ranee Narah, MP from Assam

• Pradeep Manjhi, MP from Orissa

• Sanjay Dixit, Convener of UP Congress’s NREG cell

• Madhusudan Mistri, ex-Congress MP from Gujarat

The other non-official members include Jean Dreze, Aruna Roy, Rangu Rao, K S Gopal, Prof. Ashwani Kumar, and Ramesh ‘Nana’ Pandurang Gawande.

Joshi’s move appears to be a step to corner independent experts in the panel who can pose tough taskmasters in monitoring the implementation of the scheme by the ministry.

This was clear from his own proposal in the first meeting of the CEGC where Joshi proposed setting up a Rajiv Sewa Kendra in each gram panchayat of the country from funds under NREGA and other schemes under his ministry. Joshi went on to announce setting up Rajiv Sewa Kendras in each panchayat within next three years in priority basis in presence of Rahul Gandhi on the birth anniversary of Rajiv Gandhi. This announcement came despite the fact that the minutes of the CEGC meeting suggested that the body did not approve the agenda items.

“This came out of the blue. They have also finalised a building design without any consultation with the CEGC. The minister had assured at length deliberations on all the items in the CEGC meeting on August 18,” Dreze remarked after the announcement on August 20.

Further, one of the new guardians, Narayan Singh Amlabe, went a step ahead and suggested renaming NREGS as Rajiv Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.

Though Joshi did not heed Amlabe’s suggestion, sources in the ministry reveals that while the minister got these Congress nominees inducted in CEGC, Joshi did not nominate noted NREGS activist Jean Dreze, who was behind formulating the scheme under the National Advisory Council (NAC), headed by Sonia Gandhi in the previous UPA regime, in the first place.

In fact, Joshi inducted Dreze only at the last minute before the meeting of CEGC.

Though no formal notification of the restructured CEGC has been issued, Joshi hurriedly convened the first meeting of the CEGC on August 18, to get approval of his proposals ahead of their announcement on the birth anniversary of Rajiv Gandhi on August 20. Sources further revealed that the restructured CEGC is still awaiting clearance from the Law Ministry, which has raised some objections over the composition of the body, pointing towards the inadequate representation of women, OBCs and minorities, as well as zilla parishad and labour representatives. Even the political intent of Joshi’s restructuring of the CEGC has not gone unnoticed as most of the Congress nominees inducted on the panel have been drawn from opposition-ruled states.

This is also in contrast with last time when only two sitting MPs were part of the CEGC. In fact, both MPs — Botcha Lakshmi Jhansi and RC Khuntia — were nominated to the panel as zilla parishad and labour representatives much before they got elected to Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha respectively.

Joshi is also learnt to have sidestepped the usual procedure to seek the consent of Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs before nominating sitting MPs on the CEGC.

This was clear from his own proposal in the first meeting of the CEGC where Joshi proposed setting up a Rajiv Sewa Kendra in each gram panchayat of the country from funds under NREGA and other schemes under his ministry. Joshi went on to announce setting up Rajiv Sewa Kendras in each panchayat within next three years in priority basis in presence of Rahul Gandhi on the birth anniversary of Rajiv Gandhi. This announcement came despite the fact that the minutes of the CEGC meeting suggested that the body did not approve the agenda items.